


Come Undone

by AreteNike



Series: Apocalypsestuck [2]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Apocalypsestuck, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2012-12-21
Packaged: 2017-11-21 22:36:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/602838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AreteNike/pseuds/AreteNike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eridan's introduction in the Apocalypsestuck AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come Undone

You should have gone with Fef. She always knew what to do. But instead you’re choking on sand and dirt as you lower yourself through a hole in someone’s ceiling, while the sun’s light creeps over the horizon and your lusus screams and beats itself against the few boards and mesh that are keeping you safe. 

“Anyone there?” you call as you hit the floor and try in vain to rid your clothing of the sand that coats it. The sand stays and no one answers, so you sigh heavily and pick up your gun. Seahorsedad has been following you for weeks now; you figure it’s about time to put him out of his misery.

You pry a board off the window and peer out, and decide the sun is pretty far up already and you risk getting burned if you go chasing after a rogue lusus now. Tomorrow for sure. 

Who are you kidding? You’ve been telling yourself that every day for at least a week. You will do it. Just not yet. 

Up above you, the screaming has stopped. Your lusus’s self preservation instinct must have kicked in, and he’s gone to find a place to hide from the sun. He’ll find you again tomorrow. Like always. 

You put the board back over the window. By the light seeping through the cracks in the walls, you descend further into the ruined hive. The building had been buried under mounds of sand and rubble, which was why you were in the top room at all; you are many things, but a climber isn’t one of them. Thankfully, the inside is still mostly intact, if smelling strongly of fish. It’s pretty safe, too, with the room up above with the mesh walls to keep the lusii out. You feel your way into a corner and tuck yourself into a ball around your gun. You’re asleep instantly. 

You wake up at sunset feeling lightheaded and somewhat dizzy, with the beginnings of a headache and a sour taste in your mouth. Your stomach hurts too (it’s empty). So your first order of business: food. It doesn’t occur to you that you might be dehydrated as well. What a foolish thing for a seadweller to be. 

When you stand up and fall right back down again, you entertain the thought that you might be sick. But you hardly know what to do about that, so you stand back up and use the wall for support until you get your balance back. The smell of fish is making you nauseous. You’ll have to stay here another day to recover, which you don’t like at all, but this place is easily defendable. Even if seahorsedad knows you’re here. 

You don’t find anything that night, though, nor the next. The landdwellers have picked it clean and you’re too exhausted and sick to be resentful or even to think much about it. One more day, then you’ll move on, you repeat to yourself, staggering back into the top room and coughing weakly as you push through the mesh and numbly secure it behind you. One more day, as seahorsedad screams in the distance and you trip on your way to the hole into the hive.

Your head clears only when you find you lack the strength to push yourself up again, and only briefly before panic clouds it once more. Your arms are shaking. When did your skin get so pale?

Your name is Eridan Ampora, and you might be dying.


End file.
